Wednesday, September 19, 2007

The International Nuclear Proliferation Agency

Its official name is the International Atomic Energy Agency and it is a recent winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, in one of those actions that has been giving the Nobel Peace Prize a bad name.

At the 51st session of the General Conference of the IAEA, Syria was elected deputy chair. The timing was typically appropriate, coming just two weeks after Israel apparently bombed a site at which North Korea was transferring nuclear material to Syria.

The best that can be said is that at least Syria wasn't violating the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, since it never signed that treaty.

Coincidentally, this election came about the same time Jane's Defence Weekly reported that dozens of Syrian military officers and Iranian engineers were killed July 26 as they were attempting to mount a SCUD missile with a chemical warhead.

Of course, Syria never signed the Chemical Weapons Convention, either.

This is not to say Syria has no interest in preventing the spread of weapons of mass destruction. It managed to include the alleged Israeli nuclear arsenal on the agenda of the IAEA's General Conference.

Should we be surprised the IAEA has also been totally useless in shutting down Iran's nuclear weapons program?

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